It was such pleasure to have the opportunity to meet in person, and to enter into a dialogue with, the kinds of practitioners who I had always imagined might find my book useful. These are professional people, often middle class, who have a host of professional skills at their disposal but who are, nevertheless, encountering obstacles in their efforts to reach out to and make a difference to young people living in working class neighbourhoods. Hearing Philip present his two case studies of working class youths in Bethnal Green who are struggling to behave well at school - one Bengali and one white boy - allowed us to draw out, as a group, how we can understand the boys' situation in terms of their similar social class position rather than focusing simply on their racial, ethnic or cultural difference. This enabled us to talk not just about personal meanings, peer group identity, family dynamics, school and neighbourhood pressures, but also to discuss the implications of contemporary politics for therapeutic practice.
Gillian Evans